Pain at the Pump

In 1990 California transportation accounted for 41% of California greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. California ARB(See Frame 6).
Will increased fuel costs reduce GHG emissions?

Or put another way, what might be the relationship between buying a car that used less fuel when gasoline prices go up? The Energy Institute at University of California Berkeley Haas Business School has issued an interesting study that proposes an answer. Titled Pain at the Pump, thee economists used the increase of fuel cost from close to $1 in 1999 to $4 in 2008 to perform a study of consumer's vehicle purchasing costs.

Their conclusion? A one dollar ($1.00) increase in fuel cost will increase new car sales among the most fuel efficient cars by 20% and reduce purchases of low mileage new vehicles by -24%.

As the authors put it "In the new car market, the adjustment is primarily in market shares, while in the used car market, the adjustment is primarily in prices. For a $1 increase in gas prices; the price adjustment for used cars is $2839."

"Pain at the Pump: The Differential Effect of Gasoline Prices on New and Used Automobile Markets" Meghan R. Busse, Christopher R. Knittel and Florian Zettelmeyer. Energy Institute at Haas School of Business, University of California Berkeley. December 2009. 59 p.
http://ei.haas.berkeley.edu/pdf/working_papers/WP201.pdf

Facebook is your father's Oldsmobile 2.009

An overview article Look back on 2009 includes "Social Networks go Mainstream" where Computerworld announces that Facebook and Twitter are equal opportunity communications tools for all ages and even mainstream corporations. Grandparents are joining high school and college students to use Twitter and Facebook for their own purposes. "While it's been a bit embarrassing for the kids involved to have their Uncle Fred befriend them on Facebook, the broader audience has been a boon to social networking companies." Computerworld goes on to say that Facebook and Twitter seem to have enough revenue to provide a longer term platform for communicating with the world.


Can Government commnications be 2.0 far behind? Apparently not. Governing.com has been covering the adoption of social tools in government for some time. Delicious has a huge bookmark cluster for Government 2.0.


And for automobilisti, please no internal combustion flame wars. Oldsmobile was a great car company, it just got GeeEmd, and died before GM 2.0 arrived.

Beyond Goohoo / Yagle to the dark web.

Once you go beyond Yahoo and Google you may have a chance to find more than the easy to locate 20% of internet information. Thats right, only 20%, one of a possible five web or internet items are found by big search engines. So 80% is still out there waiting. Talk about an 80/20 rule! That is like panning for gold assuming there is no gold in the rocks on both sides of the stream.

So how to find that dark matter on the web?

For an overview of emerging Web search in late 2009, wander over to Marcus Zillman's essay on Deep Web Research on the ever interesting llrx site. Chris Sherman and Gary Price coined the phrase Invisible Web back in 2001 to describe information that could not be found on the web.

Nine years later, Zillman outlines the tools that are being developed to enlarge our ability to find that invisible information. Now if only my library's use of Websense software would allow me unfettered access to listen to Zillman, I might be able to recommend "Deep Web - Exploring the Secrets of the Hiddden Internet by Marcus P. Zillman, M.S., A.M.H.A., - 23 minutes - Internet/Technology Channel"
http://www.planetearthradio.com/technology.htm But since the omniscient Websence doesn't want my pc to access Zillman's voicefile, let's just say it is itself part of the invisible web.


Bibliorati says for the highly motivated -- willing to go above and beyond the basic search -- some exotic tools for the toolbox.

US Statistical Abstracts

The newest version of the US Statistical Abstracts just came out December 6. This is one of the top 10 reference books in libraries. Now free on the Web and fee for printed version from US Gov't. Printing Office.

Data charts are generated by the US Census, with a high commitment to accuracy. The charts are consistently numbered, so past charts are easy to find. Trends from the past, up to the date of publication make this is a good tool.

For crucial policy research on emerging issues it may already be outdated as soon as it is published. If outdated why bother using it? Well, glad you asked. There is a second use that is worth exploring.

At the bottom of every table you will find the source of the statistics that have been abstracted. This tells you what federal agency gathers the data, and gives you an opportunity to look up that organization and inquire whether they have newer or perhaps preliminary figures that are more up-to-date.

Bibliorati says -- for statistics a useful starting point. Definite must have for the Policy Toolbox.

Sources of Information held by the Federal Government

Are you trying to find information that the federal government gathers? Here is a tool to try: GAO/OSI-97-2 Investigators Guide to Sources of Information: Federal Agencies Cabinet-Level Departments and Associated Agencies, published by the General Accountability Office, a.k.a. GAO. Here I was able to find the federal agency that tracks accountants and attorneys-- The Securities & Exchange Commission. Looking for retail stores that accept food stamps? -- Department of Agriculture. Real Estate Appraisers? -- General Services Administration. U.S. Savings Bonds? -- Try the Bureau of Public Debt in the Department of the Treasury.

Bibliorati says - for federal information sources a useful toolbox item.

Finding Local Government Financial Reports in California.

By law all counties, cities, and special districts in California must submit a standard report to the State Controller. The statutory authority is codified in the California Government Code, Section 53890-53897. In addition, the United States Census gathers financial and statistical data for all governments, state and local.

The Controller's office creates an annual report which in the past was reported in four printed series: Cities, Counties, School Districts and Special Districts. The California State Library is a government document depository. The library houses printed reports from the late 1950s to the present. On the Web, the Controller's office has placed the last ten years of reports, and has added series of reports as well. These annual reports, include: Cities, Counties, Public Retirement Systems, Redevelopment Agencies, School Districts, Special Districts, Streets and Roads, Transit Operators and Non-Transit Claimants, and Transportation Planning Agencies.

The California State Controller specifies the format and accounting methodology for the reports, so they are published based on data collected in a uniform manner. Not only are the statistical reports uniform from city to city, they are also gathered in the same manner each year, providing longitudinal consistency.

As a service, the Controller also provides California local governments with the required forms for the US Census survey of governments. The US Census gathers these forms and publishes a Census of Government every five years. Within the last few years the US Census has developed Web tools to create custom reports from their governmental census. This is particularly useful in comparing the relative size of the public workforce in one place versus another and provides a means to create benchmarks for fiscal performance across state boundaries.

Bibliorati says -- for that fiscal report, another tool in the policy toolbox.

California Local Government Decision Making.

California local government, be it county, city, water district, mosquito control district or library service district, is an abundant species of government. Also a bit hard to understand. If you are willing to stay up late one or two nights a week to attend hearings, have time to drop by a supervisor's office or call a board member, read every mailing or track informative web pages maybe you can stay up with local government activity in your neighborhood.

To help you along, the Institute of Local Government in Sacramento has written a nice 52 page primer, aptly titled Local Government Decision Making.

One of the curious things I learned in this guide was that there are over 7000 government entities in California, and we elect some 15,000 people to represent us in these local governments. Most trivia nuts can tell you there are 58 counties in California, and a web search will turn up some 480 cities, so that leaves about 6500 small service districts and some huge organizations. You want huge? how about the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power with close to 9000 employees and five elected commissioners. Want small to middle size? How about the Carmichael Water District, with five directors. You want obscure? How about the San Diego LAFCO? At last count, no laughing matter, 13 representatives.

With such numbers, a guide can only be general, an outline, a starting point. But hey, you have to start somewhere, and this guide is a good place to start. So before you stay up past midnight at a city council meeting, waiting for that one discussion item about the garbage truck pickup fees, get to know this little book.

Local government decision making 101 for dummies and biblio-rats.

Bibliorati says-- for California local government watchdogs-- here is your remedial class.

California Local Government Finance--Its Complicated.

There is an old quote that money is the mother's milk of politics. What that really means if that without money government services get sickly, and ignored too long, they die.

In California, city and county government actually deliver most services like public safety, social services, parks and libraries . However, these local governments do not have complete control over the services they must provide not can local government raise all the revenue needed to pay for the services. That revenue comes largely from federal and state programs and those fiscal policy decisions are made by the US federal government and by the State of California. California's state government is deadlocked over finance and tax policy, leaving cities and counties to innovate, patch, beg, borrow or defer problems to future years. Local governments have evolved a host of methods to deal with practical problems for delivering services residents expect. Among the most complex topics in California government is local government finance.

Every time a new policy directive comes down from the US or California state government, cities and counties have to adjust their service delivery plans and finances. Layer-upon-layer of program adaptation has left an extremely complex system of local government finance. News stories reduce government financial complexity to buzz words like Prop 13, realignment, subvention or ERAF. How to get past the confusion and understand the topic? Where is a newby to find out what these terms and policies actually mean?

To fill this need, the League of California Cities has assembled a combination tutorial, almanac, encyclopedia, and weblink directory to useful policy reports and press coverage. Its name says it all: The California Local Government Finance Almanac. It is updated yearly, with a long print backfile, but now the Almanac is on the Web.

In the Almanac you will find introductory primers, ERAF, overviews of Prop 13 and Prop 218,
triple flips & realignment , Vehicle License Fee (VLF) revenue, excise taxes & developer fees, the California State Budget and how it affects local government finance, and Federal funds and ARRA recovery act money.

Beyond this the site has suggested data sources and extensive links California city to web sites. One of the best of many policy reports the Almanac has found is a PPIC study by Elisa Barbour titled State-Local Fiscal Conflicts in California: From Proposition 13 to Proposition 1A

For students of California public policy, Bibliorati gives The California Local Government Finance Almanac two thumbs up.

GoogLegal

Google Scholar Legal opinions and journals

Google Scholar introduced a subset that allows us to search for legal journals and court cases. It is in early form but will no doubt grow. In no way does Google Scholar-"Legal opinions and journals" substitute for doing research in a law library. Neither is it any competition for WestLaw or Lexis Nexis, but any tool has its use.

To find it, go to
www.google.com/scholar then click the radio button under the search box. ==> [Legal opinions and journals ] and enter a search term(s) of a case name or legal term.



There is an introductory essay, http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/11/finding-laws-that-govern-us.html that provides some background on this project. Interestingly enough, Google Legal Opinions and Journals search provides cases that appear to be hosted by Google's servers rather than looking for items on the Web. That means anything found should be available in full text, avoiding the frustration of Google Scholar, which often points to a journal that tantalizes with a great title and abstract but that imposes a per-use charge to read the article.

So far I have not found a use for the law journals, as many are copyrighted. However the court cases are available in full form. Some law schools recognize the value of placing content on the Web free of charge, this Google search service will give them a much wider readership.

So what uses?
The "Cited" function is very welcome. This has been available in Google Scholar, and is now in the legal search subset as well. Looking for later work that cites an earlier landmark article or case is useful in finding similar literature. This works exactly the opposite of a bibliography, which can only cite works older than the one that has been found. Citation indexing has been around in paper form since the 1950s and now electronically by subscription from ISI/Thompson Reuters who produce the Web of Knowledge. ( http://www.isiwebofknowledge.com/ )

So how well does the "cited" search function work? In a word, nicely.
According to the "cited" function in Google, the U.S. Supreme Court case Roe v Wade has been cited 23,074 times in later cases. One could perhaps read through these opinions at about the same rate they are multiplying. Another court case, Marbury v Madison, perhaps the most important federal case of all time, gets cited 15,853 times. (So much for contemporary reproductive policy vs. the original Supreme Court case whose precedent enables U.S. courts to review and invalidate legislation.)

When, for example, the Marbury v Madison case is displayed, a second tab, "How Cited,"can be selected. This "How Cited" tab provides a case name in context within later decisions. That allows a very fast scan of cases to see how Marbury v Madison is being used to construct judicial reasoning.

Advanced search.
In Advanced Search mode, individual states can be selected, thus providing a useful limiting function. Instead of scanning 15,853 cases citing Marbury, one could select US Federal court opinions or any of the 50 states. Selecting California as the jurisdiction reduces our Marbury v Madison results list to 63 California court cases, clearly an easier number to browse through.

The advanced search box has provision for a date limitation, so a searcher could ask for court cases since 2008 citing Roe. Should a searcher want cases between 1990 to 1992, for instance, this date limiter will reduce the number of cases one has to examine.

Some of the search limitations inherent to Google search also limit the court case search.

Field searching, such as "title" or judge's "name" or "counsel" are simply not available. In advanced search mode, I was able to find articles written by Earl Warren since there is a specific line for "author." For court cases, one would have to examine the results to see if a case had been authored by Earl Warren's court, if Earl Warren was the attorney representing California (He was the Attorney General of California for a while) or simply that the case mentioned Earl Warren in the text.

Proximity searching, where two search terms must be within a certain number of words of each other is sadly missed. This is a standard tool in professional databases such as Lexis, Westlaw, Proquest, and Newsbank. Proximity searching can require an upper limit on the number of words apart the search terms can be, and specify that they be in a specific order.

The closest one can come to this functionality in Google is with phrase searching where one uses two search words inside quotation marks with an asterisk between: "firstword * lastword" to signal there are intervening words in the phrase. So for example, “Governor * California” where intervening words might be Warren, Knight, Brown, Reagan, Wilson, Deukmejian, Davis or Schwarzenegger should bring up cases where the governor is named. Because the intervening words are legion, it should not be surprising that the display shows a wide assortment of cases as result of a proximity search such as this. A better example might be “Brown * Education” which leads exactly to the case of Oliver Brown et al. v. Board of Education of Topeka et al.1954 347 U.S. 483.

Wildcard or truncation to find variants with the same word stem does not seem to be available. Google's early decision to ignore the search syntax and boolean logic available in an older search engine such as AltaVista is truly regrettable.

Searching for a legal concept can be daunting, this system works best to retrieve cases by name. For example, searching for the word "estoppel" yields many court cases containing the word, but only a vague sense of its meaning can be inferred from its usage within the cases. By contrast, a search in Wikipedia for the term "estoppel" provides useful, if not authoritative, definitions.

Displaying the results.
So far, I have not encountered scanned original pages, the case language appears to have been re-typed. This may provide opportunity for mistakes introduced during the typing. However, this is an informal search tool, scholars will want to find the historical printed decisions for faithful citation. My personal preference is for the original scanned pages to be displayed, allowing typed or OCR renditions to provide word search functionality. Perhaps there are copyright or publisher PR issues involved that prevent the scanned pages of published decisions from being displayed.

Still, Google Scholar Legal Opinions and Journals search is useful. It is joining my bookmarks for sure.

Just hope it gets a better name. Google Scholar Legal Opinions and Journals is simply too big a mouthful to make it a good name. Acronyms like Google SLOAJ sound much too close to "sludge." Maybe LegalGoogle or LawGoogle or GoogLegal.

Enjoy.
D.E.M.